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Tag Archives: books: the thousand smiles of nicholas goring

As we count down to the announcement of the main results of the Rainbow Awards 2015 on 8 December, I’d like to take another opportunity to thank Elisa Rolle and her team of judges for all their hard work.

2015 has certainly proved a stellar year for Manifold Press. We are a small publisher, and we only publish 8 titles a year – taking the time to concentrate on quality rather than quantity. Well, of the 8 titles eligible for the Rainbow Awards this year, a total of 7 earned themselves Honorable Mentions! To say we are dead chuffed would be a very English understatement.

An Honorable Mention means that at least one judge awarded the book a rating of 36 or more points out of a possible 40.

I am particularly proud, as this includes three titles with which I’m directly involved.

A really engaging story that was easy to follow despite being the 3rd book in a series I had not read.

Very heartfelt, with a poetic, enchanted feel to it. The slow pace works for this particular story. Having read the first two books in the series probably would have helped, but wasn’t necessary, which is always the sign of a great read.

And our WWI charity anthology, A Pride of Poppies, which I was honoured to edit, also did exceedingly well:

Consistently good short stories. A few were a bit weak but some deserved 40’s. Always difficult to rate a collection…

An excellent anthology of World War 1 stories all told with a remarkable eye for authenticity and a great deal of love and compassion.

A book like this is quite hard to rate. As with any anthology, some I liked, some not so much. Some of them I really loved. Overall these were a fantastic set of short stories. Only a couple of the authors I am familiar with, the others, I’ve never read anything from them. In this book we get stories about gays, lesbians and intersex. In each story we see the struggles that LGBTQIA went through in the time of WWI, the ups and downs of being different, when being unlike the rest of the population was illegal and punishable by death. I’m glad times have changed for the better and equality is within reach. I do hope that soon all the governments accept that our brothers and sisters everywhere are the same as them. Wonderful read!

There are no guarantees, of course, that this means any of these titles will also feature in the main awards – but oh I am so very happy that the other Manifold Press authors and I have received this recognition. Thank you again!

Now that the Butterfly Hunter series has reached the end of its journey, it seems right to bring out a volume that includes all three novels as well as the short story I wrote that takes place soon after the second.

This edition will only be available in paperback. With Christmas looming on the horizon, I am hoping this book might make a good stocking stuffer, or something to add to your Amazon Wish List…? There is also a Goodreads giveaway running until 15 December – be in it to win it!

In any case, thank you very kindly indeed to all of you who have accompanied Dave and Nicholas on their journey thus far. It’s time now to let them make their way ahead on their own. I’m as sad about that as anyone, mind! {sniff}

Blurb: Dave Taylor is an Aussie tour guide specialising in trips through the Queensland Outback. In some ways, however, Dave himself feels lost. He has been alone this past year, since his childhood sweetheart Denise left him and married another man. Change comes via Dave’s latest rather unexpected client, Nicholas Goring, the youngest son of an English earl. Nicholas is on the hunt for an undiscovered species of butterfly, and has hired Dave to help guide his quest. Although the two men are from very different backgrounds, they become friends, and soon their relationship grows into something more. But how easy will it be for an Australian and an Englishman to find common ground?

This volume contains the novels Butterfly Hunter, Of Dreams and Ceremonies, and The Thousand Smiles of Nicholas Goring, as well as the short story Like Leaves to a Tree.

Genre: male-male romance; contemporary; novel

Awards: Nomination in the M/M Romance Group Member’s Choice Awards 2014 on Goodreads, in the category Favorite All-Time M/M Series.

This is all very exciting! The M/M Romance Group’s 2014 Member’s Choice Awards are underway, and I’m honoured to have been nominated in a few categories. It really means so much to me to receive the nominations, so I wanted to say a big thank you!

Favorite All-Time M/M Author for little old me, with thanks to Kat

Favorite All-Time M/M Romance for The Apothecary’s Garden, with thanks to Ije

Favorite All-Time M/M Series for Butterfly Hunter, with thanks to Jacqueline

Best Established Couple for Dave and Nicholas in The Thousand Smiles of Nicholas Goring, with thanks to Kat

Best Polyamorous for A Threefold Cord, with thanks again to Kat!

The first round of voting opens on 28 November. I’m sure you’ll find all kinds of wonderful books and authors listed if you go browse the many categories!

ETA: And A Threefold Cord is through into the finals for Best Polyamorous!!!

The Goodreads giveaway for The Thousand Smiles of Nicholas Goring has now ended, and I was astonished to find that 664 people entered! That’s just awesome, and your interest in this book means the world to me.

Goodreads has selected the five winners, and the books have been ordered; they will arrive by mid December. The winners came from two countries this time, with one in the UK and four in the US.

(If you missed out, you might like to treat yourself or add it to your Wish List in time for Christmas. The book is available from all Amazon marketplaces, or directly from CreateSpace.)

Thank you again. I wish you happy reading no matter which book you pick up next!

I’m happy and grateful for the response to this third volume in my Butterfly Hunter series. Thank you to everyone who is accompanying Dave and Nicholas through the last chapters of their journey together!

Introduction: OMG, beautiful, absolutely beautiful. It is of course no secret that I have just loved this series so far but the third and final book just brings everything to a close of what has been just one gorgeous and exquisite story from beginning to end.

Mark also asked me to do a video for the Sinfully Sexy site, so please go check it out! I make a fool of myself, but hey it’s all for the best cause – that is, True Love!

Excerpt: I love the care with which Julie Bozza writes David and Nicholas. She’s very deliberate in the ways she progresses their story, their relationship, their interactions and as someone who’s taken this journey with them through the series, I appreciate it so much.

Kaje gave it 4 stars, and said: I love established-couple romances, and this one was smooth and lovely to read.

Kat gave it 5 stars, and said: This makes me happy, the perfect ending to a wonderful series.

Don Bradshaw gave it 4 stars, and said: Written perfectly in Ms Bozza’s descriptive style the reader feels as though they have discovered something magical

Niki gave it 5 stars, and said: The writer could not have ended this series in a better way. Dave and Nicholas have come a long way as this 3rd book revisit them 7 years later.

Readers’ Responses

Dianne listed it in her Best of ’14 and said: Gorgeous writing. The perfect, beautiful love and understanding between Nicholas and his Davey is once again delivered in stunning form. The series story arc is delivered full circle in reverent prose. The sublime Australian outback and culture plays a crucial and unforgettable role. When I read this book, this series…I am right there with them. I’ll never look at a blue butterfly again without thinking of these two men.

I know I’m rather late to the party, but it was Asexual Awareness Week from 26 October to 1 November this year. I only found out rather belatedly – and I have to say it left me a bit flummoxed about how to best mark the occasion. Because the new book I was releasing on 1 November (y’all know its title by now) has an asexual character, and I was a bit wary about being all “Yay! Party! Party! Have some cake! Here, buy my book.”

Now that a discreet week has gone by, though, I thought I might post with a clear conscience.

Asexuality has been around for as long as there has been human beans, of course, but it’s only relatively recently been a subject much discussed in public forums. Back in the 1940s Kinsey recognised that some people didn’t fit on his ‘scale’ of sexual orientation from 0-6 (from heterosexual to homosexual). He dubbed them category ‘X’, which he defined as individuals with “no socio-sexual contacts or reactions”. This included 1.5% of the adult male population.

Other research has also indicated that perhaps asexual individuals make up about 1% of the overall population. However, there is also cause to wonder if the figures aren’t under-reported, and proper research studies have been few and far between over the decades. I wouldn’t be surprised if the figures turn out to be more like 5% or 10% of the population, for asexuality would have to be one of the most invisible and overlooked letters in the glorious GLBTQIA quiltbag.

Wikipedia defines asexuality as “the lack of sexual attraction to anyone, or low or absent interest in sexual activity”. It is not abstinence or celibacy, which are chosen behaviours. Instead, it is an ‘enduring’ and intrinsic part of a person that is generally considered as another sexual orientation (along with heterosexuality, homosexuality and bisexuality).

As with many aspects of humanity, there are infinite variations within the overall identity. Some asexuals feel sexual attraction even if they don’t care to act on it, and others don’t. Some feel romantic attraction, and others don’t. Some enjoy physical affection, and others don’t. Some masturbate, and others don’t. Some may feel romantic and sexual attraction in the right, very rare circumstances, and others won’t.

One of the only common threads I’ve picked up in reading or listening to the stories of people who identify as asexual, is that it often took them a long while – years or even decades – to realise who they were and to find a name for it. Asexuality really has been such an invisible thing – or perhaps such a quiet thing, and so drowned out by our culture’s insistent interest in sex and relationships, and the related assumptions about who people ‘really are’.

Of course even when an individual manages to identify themselves correctly, they still may face a harrowing ‘coming out’ process. If it has taken an asexual a long time to understand their own self, how long will it take the people around them to understand, when they don’t have that same interior knowledge or vested interest? I should think that sexual people generally will find it hardest of all to understand or empathise with asexuality, as our sexual nature is seen as so ‘ingrained’. It might be far easier to understand other sexual beings, even when their sexuality is oriented differently to one’s own. I imagine the response being, ‘Well, at least they’re into sex, you know!’

And here we are at our last stop on my blog tour… Last but certainly not least is Adventurous Hearts, a blog featuring ‘adventures in romance and erotica’ by NM Harris, otherwise lovingly known as Narrelle (or Relle).

Narrelle invited me to drop by and answer her Quintette of Questions. As it was my second go, I asked Nicholas Goring himself to help me answer a couple. So, if you’d like to know who Nicholas thinks should star as him and as David in the film of the book, or which song used to make him cry, please drop by!

You can find the blog post here. Please visit my mate Relle! She is a terrific storyteller, and she’s also generously hosted Quintettes for all kinds of fascinating authors, so I’m sure you won’t regret having a browse.

And in the meantime: Thank you so much for being part of the celebrations around my launch of The Thousand Smiles of Nicholas Goring… It’s been grand! ♥

Today’s heavenly haven on my blog tour is Charlie Cochrane‘s journal. She asked me a series of questions that I found fascinating to answer.

You can find the interview on this page of Charlie’s blog. If you’d like to know something about what I do for my ‘day job’, and which of my characters I’d like to help me out of a sticky situation, then hop on by. As a bonus you’ll find out which classic book I want kudos for actually finishing, and which gay fiction book I’m currently recommending.

Please come and visit! Charlie’s a lovely host, and we’re running a Rafflecopter draw for a copy of The Thousand Smiles of Nicholas Goring.

Good luck with the giveaway! And please give me old mate Charlie some love. ♥

The wonderful Sue Brown, my fellow author and a particularly generous member of our community, has welcomed me dropping by the UK Gay Romance website on my blog tour today. The site supports UK authors of m-m romance as well as authors who set their m-m romance stories in the UK. Sue organised the UK Gay Romance book signing in London that I attended in September, and is hoping to organise another event outside the capital.

You can find my post on the UK Gay Romance site here. It includes all the details you need about my new novel The Thousand Smiles of Nicholas Goring. I also talk about my reasons for choosing opals as the visual motif for this book. Opals are a particularly Australian phenomenon, and they are relevant to Dave and Nicholas’s story in all kinds of other ways, too.

I am also running a Rafflecopter giveaway via this post! You’ll find the link at the bottom of the page. Over the next few days you can enter for a chance to win a copy of any of the Butterfly Hunter books in any format you wish.

I hope that you’ll find opals as fascinating as I do, and I wish you well with the giveaway. Be sure to leave some love for Sue, and have fun browsing the UK Gay Romance site!

Images

I received a free copy of this novella from the author - the wonderful Relle - in return for an honest review.
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